such pains
to keep me from sharing his fate, is one of those anomalies in human
nature which now and then awake our astonishment. If I had not lost
Dora through my detention at their hands I should look back upon that
evening with sensations of thankfulness. As it is, I sometimes
question if it would not have been better if they had let me take my
chances.

* * * * *

Have I lost Dora? From a letter I received to-day I begin to think not.

THE MAN FROM RED DOG

By ALFRED HENRY LEWIS

Copyright 1897 by Frederick A. Stokes Company.

"Let me try one of them thar seegyars."

It was the pleasant after-dinner hour, and I was on the veranda for a
quiet smoke. The Old Cattleman had just thrown down his paper; the
half-light of the waning sun was a bit too dim for his eyes of seventy
years.

"Whenever I behold a seegyar," said the old fellow, as he puffed
voluminously at the principe I passed over, "I thinks of what that
witness says in the murder trial at Socorro.

"'What was you-all doin' in camp yourse'f,' asked the jedge of this
yere witness, 'the day of the killin'?'

"'Which,' says the witness, oncrossin' his laigs an' lettin' on he
ain't made bashful an' oneasy by so much attentions bein' shown him,
'which I was a-eatin' of a few sardines, a-drinkin' of a few drinks of
whiskey, a-smokin' of a few seegyars, an' a-romancin' 'round.'"

After this abrupt, not to say ambiguous reminiscence, the Old Cattleman
puffed contentedly a moment.

"What murder trial was this you speak of?" I asked. "Who had been
killed?"

"Now I don't reckon I ever does know who it is gets downed," he
replied. "This yere murder trial itse'f is news to me complete. They
was waggin' along with it when I trails into Socorro that time, an' I
merely sa'nters over to the co't that a-way to hear what's goin' on.
The jedge is sorter gettin' in on the play while I'm listenin'.

"'What was the last words of this yere gent who's killed?' asked the
jedge of this witness.

"'As nearly as I keeps tabs, jedge,' says the witness, 'the dyin'
statement of this person is: "Four aces to beat."

"'Which if deceased had knowed Socorro like I does,' says the jedge,
like he's commentin' to himse'f, 'he'd shorely realized that sech
remarks is simply sooicidal.'"

Again the Old Cattleman relapsed into silence and the smoke of the
principe.

"How did the trial come out?" I queried. "Was the accused found
guilty?